Russia: EU Summit Missed Chance To Narrow Split

Russia says the two-day EU Eastern Partnership summit in Riga has lost "another opportunity to make a step toward bridging a widening gap on the continent."

The Foreign Ministry said on May 22 that the Eastern Partnership Program, which includes Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Belarus, "essentially remains an over-ideologized geopolitical project, whose implementation is negatively affected by certain EU member states with their historical anti-Russian complexes."

The statement added that the EU "once again muttered its inadequate position on Crimea," the Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Russia in March 2014.

In their joint declaration, the summit participants "acknowledge the European aspirations and European choice of the partners concerned."

It also states that the EU "reaffirms its position against the illegal annexation" of Crimea.